Originally Posted by
Clea
That is an insightful article. The author is correct that Marvel leans heavily on buddy-buddy humor and wise-cracking banter in its storytelling style. That's true in the comics and even more so in the movies. DC characters tend to be more serious. The MCU characters might feel a bit more like real adults if they didn't always crack jokes ever other line, and if they were able to show that even the heroes aren't all automatically friends. For example Doctor Strange should not be dropping jokes at the same rate and style as Peter Parker. Strange is a much more serious character. He's more of a loner than someone who's going to join groups and pal around.
Strange has traveled around in other dimensions, and through time, and to outer space, but he's mainly modern earth based because he is the modern protector of the contemporary earth dimension. They could always put him into a fantasy world setting for a particular story, but he's not Gandalf. That bit of dialogue you quoted above was really more to show Bucky's age -- he was around to read the Hobbit when it was just published, and also to add a bit more flavor to Bucky's own personality: he liked reading fun fantasy stories back before he was turned into an assassin, so the dark, tortured guy we see now used to be much more lighthearted and normal back in the day. Maybe that aspect of him is still in him and we'll see more of it over time. Who knows. Marvel likes to have little call-outs and hooks between their movies and tv shows, so maybe in an upcoming film, Bucky or Sam will be a scene with Strange and one of them will call him Gandalf.
As for Strange battling personal demons...Yes, that was a running refrain in the classic Strange series. His 'demons' were loneliness and a tendency to brood over the fact that he had to sacrifice his personal life because of his duty, to the point where he would not even share himself 100% with those closest to him (Clea, Wong, others).